Hello Hauptwerk Members,
I'm pleased to see that quite a few people have accessed my web site and downloaded some or all of the files there. I will leave the present files there for a bit longer, untill the count seems to stop rising, and then I plan to replace the current files with different ones that demo the Hauptwerk sounds I'm getting.
I do prefer the dry, non-echo type sound. I use my Hauptwerk instrument for recording and I need to hear all the detail I can. Of course, some organ music was composed for the large environment and probably sounds better there. However, I remember my first experience with midi Bach. Up until then, I had heard only Bach recordings in large, very reverbrant cathedrals. Of course, I loved it. But when I first heard all the notes when played by a computer, it brought tears to my eyes (no kidding) as I realized how much of the intricate beauty of Bach's music I had been missing. I had never seen a score or had an instrument to try to play that music on back then, so I had had the impression that the big Bach works were mostly massive chord shiftings.
I have tried adding reverb later to my Hauptwerk files. That works fine. It does make a piece such as the Widor Toccata (5th Symph.) sound more impressive, but again, notes are blurred and lost. I just leave my recordings with Hauptwerk with as little reverb as possible for now.
I was VERY impressed with the mp3 sounds from the OrganArt Media (Prof. Helmut Maier) Cavaillé-Coll organ. Now that's the sound I have been looking for. My current custom organ is trying to sound like that, I think. That Krebs prelude comes about as close as I can come so far. I hope I'll be able to afford the OrganArt files. We'll see. That organ does seem to have plenty of reverb, but perhaps the pipes were recorded up close or something, because there doesn't seem to be a muddled reverb effect that I can hear. I have always felt that the Cavaillé-Coll organ in St Sulspice, Paris, is the finest sounding organ I've ever heard! But it's huge. I was amazed and delighted that OrganArt's much smaller instrument nevertheless has that same wonderful sound!
Anyway, I will post again when I change the files on my webpage, for those of you who wish to sample them. I hope some of those present files have been enjoyed by you.
Leo Chris.